Jeff at Notes on the Atrocities on the strange reactions to the reports of torture coming out of Iraq:
But thinking a bit more, I started to see how it makes sense. Americans, and certainly our current leadership, see themselves as innately good. It’s an old bit of the Calvinist logic–God rewards those who are righteous, so you can tell who are righteous by looking at who has been rewarded. The US is morally superior–we know this a priori, without reference, just by virtue of looking at the abundance of McDonald’s and Gap stores.
Believing in our innate goodness is an essential fault of the neocon agenda, and it cuts two ways. Of course, there’s nothing morally superior about Americans. Put them in a situation of extreme distress of an extended period of time and a certain percentage will lose it and commit atrocities. Behaving thusly does not reveal a hidden fault in righteousness of America–unless, I guess, you actually believed we were superior. That’s the first cut, and I believe it’s responsible for the “doesn’t represent us” reaction.